Moving...

While I'll leave this blog up for a bit, this group has wrapped up its 10-week course. Starting in January, we will no longer be simply the "Schaeffer" group but will begin wrestling with the works of all dead theologians. Starting Thursday (note the day change), January 18th at 7pm, we will be begin meeting as the Dead Theologians Society (Lakeview Edition). Though the blog for that group has not yet begun, you can keep an eye out here to see it develop.

I pray that you have a blessed Christmas and find yourself with unexpected opportunities to bless others. See you next year! (Don't you just roll your eyes every time you hear that each year?)

Week Ten: Final Choices

This was the final week of this ten-week focus group. It's really been a pleasure working through this series with this neat group of people, so much so that this group is going to continue as an ongoing cyclical focus group. I'll get back to that in a moment.

Schaeffer addressed the future (our present, in many ways) in this installment. He looked at the inevitable product of humanistic thinking--authoritarianism. Insightfully, he steered us away from viewing authoritarianism strictly in terms of dictatorships and suggested that authoritarianism is getting a foothold incrementally in the Western world. People continue to want personal peace and affluence and are often willing to give up freedoms to assure that they have them. While some people suggest that the Patriot Act is such a compromise (and it is in many ways), I suggested that this creeping incrementalism can be seen more subtly in the McCain-Feingold Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act and similar legislation. These appear on the surface to "get the money out of politics" but in reality are efforts designed to keep incumbents in office and restrict the 1st Amendment rights of dissenters.

The solution to this problem? People turning and returning to Christ and biblical teachings. Christians do not have to be in the majority to have an impact on the consensus. Particularly in an age when apathy seems to rule, those willing to speak and act out of a vibrant Christian faith will have a disproportionate impact on society, not only because of their contrast to the status quo but because God is working in them and through them.

May we have the courage to be such people.

Though this group was only a ten-week commitment, I believe we've discovered a unique niche. I've enjoyed the discussions as much as the book and video, and think that something very good and edifying has been born here. As a result, what was started as a short-term group is going long-term. In January, those who wish to continue, and those who wish to join us, will be kicking off the Dead Theologians Society, Lakeview Edition. This group will be working through the works of dead theologians (truth in advertising!). We will read a book, a chapter or selection at a time, and come together to discuss it. This blog will be exchanged for a new one: dtslakeview.blogspot.com It is bare at the moment but details will be posted in the coming weeks, both on the blog and in the bulletin (possibly) and small group catalog.

Week Nine: The Age of Personal Peace & Affluence

"If there is no absolute by which to judge society, then society is absolute."

One of things that stuck out to me this past week was Schaeffer's description of a move towards sociological law in this country. This is law that is based on nothing concrete but rather the will of the people or the elite and their perception of what's best for the people. It is relativistic; what's good law one year may not be the next. An excellent case in point is the evolution of the so-called right to abortion in the U.S. which Schaeffer discusses at some length. [For a good overview of the history of abortion law in the U.S., look here (the author used to change my diapers, incidentally).]

Now, we have been taught that democracy is the noblest form of government, and it is a far cry better than most other forms (a monarchy with a perfect monarch would be best), but it must be based on something other than public opinion. It must be rooted in absolutes. Our legislative and executive branches currently have some accountability as to whether or not they're serving under absolutes, if voters are willing to exercise their responsibilities, but the judicial branch has no real checks and balances and has gone from interpreting the law to creating it. So, with a populace that has largely abandoned Christian principles and a Supreme Court which may or may not act in ways consistent with our faith, it would seem that the future of our country is unpredictable, to say the least.

And yet, in spite of dire predictions and a general distaste for politics that we may have, we have a quarter we can call on (as Schaeffer puts it) that the world does not understand. We have a high calling to be salt and light in our world, but it is not without the help of the King of Kings.

This week, the final installment of the DVD series, will be about the future--how we avoid the shift towards authoritarianism and chaos. It should be a very good discussion. A follow-up to our discussion on Catholicism is likely, too.

Next week, those who've attended the group are invited to my place for dinner. It will be a time of fellowship and, hopefully, a chance to talk about those wonderful tangential things that we don't always have time to pursue fully.

Starting in January, this group will morph into a cyclical focus group called the Dead Theologians Society which will look at the works of--you guessed it--dead theologians. Stay tuned!